you say ‘telephone’?

If you aren’t satisfied with some technological contraption, wait five minutes and there will be a new one. And, if you say “telephone” instead of whatever term is current to the nanosecond, you’re labeled downright prehistoric.

I said “telephone” to a young person recently and the resulting snickers gave me pause to check if I was simultaneously scratching my side with one hand and the top of my head with the other while going “oooguh, oooguh.”

When I whipped out my ringing four-year-old Samsung “cell phone,” the snickers became belly laughs.

“How do you manage to communicate with that thing?” the 20ish whippersnapper said.

“I just press this button right here and say ‘hello’,” I replied, trying to sound cool.

But, I didn’t fool Young Techie. He saw my external crystal was broken (dropped the phone once) and I had to manually the phone to see the “caller ID,” then punch the green phone receiver button to answer.

“It’s cheaper to text,” smirked Techie. “I have apps that let me do that while surfing the ‘Net, plus I have the 15,000-characters a-month plan but I’m using more, so I’m upgrading.

“I’m already on a 4G and I can see you haven’t even tried 3G.”

“4G. Does that have anything to do with Army Intelligence?” I asked with a wave of my hand.

More snickers.

“Besides,” I said, becoming defensive, “I do a lot of writing, or texting you may call it, on an Apple MacIntosh computer.”

Young Smart Aleck broke out in guffaws. “Bet it’s hard to carry in your pocket.”

I felt like a country bumpkin.

When I was small, we lived on a ranch and had no phone, electricity or indoor plumbing.

Some of my relatives had the old wooden box, battery-powered, handcranked rural telephones with as many as 12-15 on one party line.

We moved “to town” and immediately got a phone almost no one today would recognize. It came in one color, black, and had a large oval base. Another piece, attached by a wire to the base, sat in a cradle atop the base and contained the hearing and speaking devices. There was no dial. When you picked up the piece from the cradle, an operator would come on the line and ask what number you wished to call.

If it was a local number, you just gave the number. That call, and all other local ones, were covered in your monthly fee. If you wanted long distance, you said “long distance” to the local operator and she connected you with a long disunfold tance operator. Long distance calls were billed by the minute.

There were two options with long distance. The cheapest version was a station to-station call, which merely required your telling the long distance operator the number and the town in which it was located. The operator had to connect to another operator in that town to “ring” the requested number.

Person-to-person calls meant the operator stayed on the line and if someone answered, the operator said, “This is long distance for Junior Sample.” If it wasn’t Junior, then either they said Junior wasn’t there or they called him to the phone and you talked. If he wasn’t in, there was no charge for the operatorassisted call.

Of course, everyone figured out how to use that to their advantage. Say, you drove to your hometown to see your parents and, upon leaving, they insisted on letting them know you’d reached home safely. Upon arriving at your house, you placed a person-to-person call for some non-existent person at your folks’ house. Upon answering and hearing the operator tell them there was a person-to-person call for John Doe, the parent would reply, “He’s not in.” You’d tell the operator you’d place the call later and your parents knew you’d arrived safely, and you didn’t have to upgrade because it cost you nothing.

So, there, Young Techie.

I feel better now.

Willis Webb is a retired community newspaper editor publisher of more than 50 years experience. He can be reached by email at wwebb@wildblue.net.